On set with The Hillywood Show: Sherlock Parody
* 21 August 2016

March 22 2016 - North
Gower Street, London

We're on a familiar street, outside a familiar cafe, with a
black door with some very familiar numbers (and the second letter
of the alphabet) attached to it. Over the road, passersby
occasionally stop and stare at the figure with black curly hair in
the long coat. At that first glance, Sherlock Holmes is back at
221B. But closer examination reveals he is actually a good couple
of feet shorter than normal. And if you got really close, and were
able to look past the excellent make up, you'd realise that he was
in fact actually a she. This isn't Benedict Cumberbatch, this is
Hilly Hindi, one half of USA internet sensations The Hillywood
Show. And she and her sister Hannah have come all the way from Las
Vegas to shoot their latest parody dedicated to Sherlock on the
streets on London.

We're here to observe, and also to deliver a few critical props.
We've already helped the team out in their pre-production:
co-ordinating the shoot with Speedy's owner Chris and his son
George, suggesting locations for filming, sending over the exact
iconic flock wallpaper for the wall of their set build of 221B back
in the States on their behalf, and have spent an extended period of
time back-and-forthing with the suppliers of those famous front
door numbers. They are already up, carefully affixed to the black
door as they always are when filming on the actual series is
underway. Today though, we've trekked from our nearby corner of the
country to supply a certain pink suitcase to the team, and we've
not felt self-conscious (or more adverse to taxi travel) while
making our way to London at all.

The team that is shooting this production is small in comparison
to the one that rolls up to shoot Sherlock proper, but they're no
less motivated, or equipped. A 6K Red Epic Dragon is the camera of
choice, and the pavement is piled high with equipment cases and
lighting. A couple of the crew have travelled over from the States,
but the majority are volunteers, university students happy to pitch
in and lend their support to try and make the rather rapid shoot go
smoothly. For a couple of them, they're on security watch - and to
our amusement, it's actually stricter than on the actual show. Any
sign of a passerby attempting to take a photo, and a member of the
team is off over the road to politely ask them not to share the
image online.

That may seem strict, but there is a reason for it. As The
Hillywood Show is crowd funded there is a close eye kept on
production by the team's fans, and so there's a fear that any early
and unofficial leaks could create dissatisfaction with how make up
and costume look -when of course the main reason any negativity
could crop up is because those pictures are blurry and shot from
far away.

Despite all the dashing around by the crew though, it's
inevitable that filming on this location would cause a bit of a
stir - especially with those door numbers in place on the front
door. Filming on the series is still a few weeks away, but it's
still close enough for the famous #Setlock group to buzz into life
on Twitter when the Hillywood production is discovered. Initially
there's confusion as to exactly what is going on, but there's a
quick realisation that it's a fan production shooting and not the
real thing.

Coming from overseas means there's been an awful lot of overseas
preparation besides getting wallpaper and door numbers of course.
The production team have hired a black London Taxi cab for the day,
with the vehicle reserving the parking space outside Speedy's for
un-obscured shots. In this respect, everything feels exactly like
actual Sherlock filming - the most common use of North Gower Street
in the show is walking to and from a taxi after all! Hilly paces to
and from the cab, her strides in time with the beat of the music
that will eventually be laid over the soundtrack - today it's
playing in small chunks from a portable stereo. The live music is
the only real difference from the real thing (unless Steven Moffat
and Mark Gatiss decide to pull a Joss Whedon and give us a musical
episode in the future of course), as multiple takes of taxi
interaction occur before the setup is changed to focus on the front
door of 221B. Low camera angles and stage apple boxes are all
brought into play to give Hilly the required Holmes height to
interact with the door numbers...

Hannah then joins her as John, and some excellent miming is
brought into play to match up with the song lyrics as a complex
single operator camera move is performed by Shun, the camera
operator - moving along a dolly track while pulling focus on the
camera at the same time is a physically demanding task. And
remarkably, the shot appears for mere frames in the final
product!

From there, it's onto the next stage of filming. Hilly and
Hannah had asked us over email if we knew where we could locate a
dumpster for filming. Not being London natives, we were at a mild
loss, but put them in contact with Chris and George at Speedy's who
were able to provide suggestions. So a smaller part of the crew
packs up the equipment to handheld capability and heads around the
back of North Gower Street to Foundry Mews, a secluded
alleyway and yard space. A suitable bin is found (empty, not super
clean but better than most on offer) and moved to a suitable spot
for filming. We hand over the pink suitcase for use in the filming,
and Hilly gamely is given a helping hand by George into the bin
itself. For a few takes, she rises up clutching the case, a
decisive Sherlock expression on her face. Once successfully
extracted, the case is lobbed into the bin to create the earlier
moment in the video. It's done a bit bodily we have to admit, and
in the end the pristine finish does pick up a few scuffs. We're
relatively ok with sacrificing a prop in the name of art
though...

Working with rubbish done, it's back to North Gower Street, and
then down Stephenson Way at the south end of the road. It's time to
finish off our visit with filming some action inserts of Sherlock
and John running. Once everything is set, Hilly and Hannah perform
multiple takes, both looking incredibly the part as they sprint up
the length of the street. Sherlock's coat flaps, John brings up the
rear. It's basically perfect.

London is about to devolve into the madness of rush hour though,
so it's time for us to make our farewells and head home, mildly
dinged pink case in hand. Over the next few days, the Hillywood
crew will go on a bit of tour of famous Sherlock locations, heading
to a familiar swimming pool and even out into the wilds of Dartmoor
to possibly look for a gigantic Hound. Even back in March, it was
obvious there was a level of care and attention to detail in play
to capture the look of the BBC series perfectly. We were hugely
impressed by what we saw on set in the few hours we were there on
the day, and the final results certainly blew us away!

Check out the incredibly thorough full story of production in
The Hillywood Show behind the scenes documentary. (There is a tiny
cameo from us in there!)